Karura
by rpmuleftw
Summary: Gaara visits his mother's grave. AU. Drabbleish.


The flowers look wrong there. What use are they, anyway? What do they symbolise? Kill a thing of beauty only to present it as a gift for someone who is no longer around to appreciate the gesture? It's a useless thing, a cruel thing, yet Gaara still finds himself placing the pink and white bouquet at the foot of the stone slab. Grass and dirt stain his jeans as he kneels by the grave, an uncleanliness he sees as only fitting considering just what he is here to commemorate.

He knows how it's supposed to work: The silent graveyard, the perfect weather (neither warm nor chilly, possibly with a drizzle to complement the unfortunate turn of events), the grief-stricken child giving a respectable moment of silence and then, as a perfect, solitary tear runs down their cheek, never sobbing, never the heavy, hulking hiccups with snot running from the nose and an awful swelling of the eyes, saying something so utterly profound it leaves the audience speechless as they walk from the theater in a frisson-induced daze. That's how it goes in movies, right?

But the plots are narrow and a family pays their respects to one of their own deceased just a few lines down. Gaara can hear their murmurs in the wind. The cool winter air chaps his lips, reddens pale cheeks. Yesterday, the weather report threatened snow. The flowers will wilt soon. It's too freezing, too overcast. He shouldn't have brought them.

"…Hi, Mom."

The grave is neat but simple, a solid gray headstone sharply cut and not yet worn down by age. A swirled pattern decorates the arched top, and below it prints: Karura – Loving Mother, Wife. Gaara can't bear to look at the dates beneath.

Had he a choice, he would have designed a grand statue, an life-sized angel to look down upon those who visit her, smiling the way his mother had – the soft quirk of lips, one of the only traits Gaara inherited, though replicating it upon his own mouth is an increasingly rare occurrence. The wings would be closed against her back but eyes warm, arms inviting in the ghost of a hug.

All of that, he thinks, instead of the headstone so insufficient, so utterly unencompassing of everything his mother truly was.

"I know I should visit more."

His chin trembles. It's an action he doesn't attempt to curb, even when accompanied by a sharp and involuntary inhale. The cold air scrapes his lungs and leaves them raw.

"I just wish you could hear me. Temari thinks you can, but she's always been like that. She was closest to you, anyway." The words tumble from his lips before he can stop them. One gloved hand clenches against his thigh. "Can you, I wonder? If so, why don't you contact us in return? They say our loved ones reappear in dreams, in the shadows, in the corners of our eyes…"

The wind whistles overhead. The family nearby begins praying; Gaara can hear them, can see their joined hands and closed eyes, can see them swaying in front of their own plot. It's too cold to be visiting the dead.

"Then why can't I see you? There are some days your face drenches my every thought, and some days when I cannot remember your voice. It scares me."

Hi cheeks are wet, and he tastes salt. His nose, already pink from sub-zero temperatures, drips in the way he hoped it wouldn't, and he fishes in his pockets in vain for a tissue. The next few minutes are filled with attempted silence, broken only by choked sobs and an ugly noise in the back of his throat he can't quite quell. Words don't seem to matter here and Gaara wonders, as the back of his arm rises to swipe at stray tears, just for whose benefit this visit is for.

"We are broken, here. Without you." He shuffles forward to lean against the headstone, caressing the frozen granite as if it were skin of a softer sort. One day, Gaara _(hopeswishespleads)_ knows, he will no longer need this false imitation of life; one day, he will heal, one day he see the colours of the sun again, one day he may laugh. Instead his mouth trembles in a grimace of a frown, darkened eyes squinted and stinging for more reasons than the temperature.

"But…we are alive. Some days I am glad of this. Others…."

It's getting late. The other family has long since left, packed up in their car, driven home and left him all alone here. How dare they?

"I'm stronger than I was. You'd be proud of that. I hope, wherever you are, that you too are strong. But wherever you are, whatever you are…"

Another gust of wind blows at the petals of his cut flowers, threatening to rip them right off the stem. Gaara stands to his feet and pulls his scarf securely around his mouth, making his last words muffled, though they are hardly more than a whisper anyway.

"…You are gone from me."


End file.
